Friday, January 2, 2015

Chocolate Cuddle Cake

January 5, 2015

This is a wonderful chocolate cake, with a rich ganache on the sides, but it's the caramel whipped cream that steals the show. It's unique and fantastically delicious. You do have to go through a LOT of steps before you're allowed to sit down and enjoy a piece, but it's all worth it.

First, you need a rose nail. I'm pretty sure I bought one for one of the Heavenly Cakes (one of my rare forays into the mysterious aisles of Michael's), but I couldn't find it. Luckily for me, Woody was baking with me and he was undaunted by the lack of a little nail. He was sure Jim had nails in his workshop. (It's a little optimistic to refer to Jim's tiny space in the basement as a workshop, but he did indeed have a manly nail, not a girly rose nail).

See the ruler and pencil in the background? A sure sign that Woody is nearby. I won't say I never measure anything, but when he asked for my ruler, I said blankly, "ruler?" as if I'd never heard of such a thing. (In fairness to me, I do have a measuring tape. In fairness to Woody, he's the one who gave it to me.)

Those same parchment strips attached to the sides of the springform pan.

And the makeshift rose nail centered in the pan.

And there is the same nail when I put the cake in the oven.

And when it's ready to come out. You can see why you have to add the parchment support system. Otherwise, there would be burning cake batter all over the bottom of my oven.

A view from the top. Obviously, the parchment's not as sturdy as the metal pan. I wonder if you could avoid the parchment pan altogether if you had a taller springform pan. But do they make them taller than that? A quick search for "deep springform pan" didn't yield much, but I did find this -- it's 3 3/4" high. I will ponder whether it's worth getting this.

More makeshift gadgetry here, but all you need is four cans, all the same height, and a cooling rack.

Remember the nail? There it is, still sticking out of the top of the pan. It's a good thing Woody was here, or I would have probably just tried to pull the nail out of the pan, forgetting about its foil base. I'm so glad I didn't do that.

It worked much better to turn the cake over and slowly pull it out so it just has a hole the size of a slim nail, not a giant gouge.

Pull the parchment off and it starts to look like a cake, not a hardware store.

"Get the ruler, Marie." "Why?" "So we can measure the finished cake. Don't you always do that?" "No, why would I? It's too late to do anything about it." I think that this was more or less the correct height, and it made Woody happy to have this shot, so there you are. How many of you measure the height of your finished cakes?

I actually do use my thermometer, even when Woody is not supervising me, and especially when I'm making caramel. I don't know why we took a picture at 333, though, because it had to get up to 370.

The hardest part of this cake was the ganache. It started to go on smoothly, but the ganache started getting a little too hard, and I was having a very hard time covering the sides smoothly. Woody was very encouraging: "Just massage it, Marie." That made no sense to me, and I told him. He tried again: "It's just like doing cement work." Not particularly helpful either, but it did make me wonder if the Wicked Witch used ganache to make her gingerbread house.

It impressed me that Woody was able to urge the ganache up over the top of the cake.

I've hardly shown any pictures of actually baking the cake--they've almost all been of its construction, because that was the hard part for me. The cake itself, even though it has multiple steps, was not difficult. Time-consuming yes, but not difficult.

I took this cake to book club, where it was received with more enthusiasm than met the book. One woman said when she looked at the cake, she didn't even notice the ganache--she thought it was just the cake. Then she took a bite, and not only got a wonderful chocolate cake but also something that "tasted like the best piece of chocolate in the world." Like me, everyone was most impressed with the caramel whipped cream, which was described as "decadent," "fabulous," and "out of this world."

When I got home, there was just one piece of cake left, and just enough light for Jim to shoot a final picture in the daylight.

No chocolate curls on this cake, and the texture isn't as perfect as the one in the book, but Rose's beautiful cake couldn't have met with more enthusiastic eaters than this cake did. And thanks, Woody, for your help with the cement, I mean the ganache.

27 comments:

Excellent job. Just how many recipes has Woody been there to assist you with? For the record, I have 4 rulers in my baking drawer.... and yes, I've been known to measure the finished height from time to time, but only when Rose tells us what the finished height should be. I'll be baking tomorrow - can't wait to try that whipped cream. It sounds amazing. PS - your cake looks perfect so I don't think it suffered from your shorter springform.

...And met by me with the greatest of enthusiasm for your demonstration of all the setbacks I can envision - I can't begin to relay them, but as I wondered about the nail, there I beheld a little tape. Thanks for your lively, and also enthusiastic explanations. I think making light of some of these manoeuvers makes it not so daunting for me, and probably all of us. Thanks one more time for being there and doing what you do, and for how you do it ! xo

Another great post, Marie, and once again, I am jealous of you for having Woody as your baking partner! I LOVE this cake! It is the best! I will get my post up this weekend. Why on earth did he want to measure the height of the cake, though?! Like you said--it's not like you can do anything to change it! I am hoping you are keeping warm up there in the frozen north--Michele

Woody was here in the fall, and we baked 3 things together: this cake, the Kouigns, and the coffee almond crisps. Now I'm on my own, and I guess I'll have to come up with my own makeshift baking gadgets.

One of the things I miss most about being a child was being measured on the kitchen door. There is no achievement quite as powerful in my adult life but then again, I now have cakes to measure. Beautiful job Marie! I'm remembering how much I love the caramel whipped cream. The annual Food Arts Epiphany party coming up and we have plans to make the Triple Chocolate Proposal cake from the Cake Bible. I haven't made it in years and Woody has never experienced it so it seems that now is as good time as any.

Hello Marie ,what a lovely chocolate Cuddle cake and amazing whipped Caramel .That looks pretty high in height for me ,you did a great job and your write up is nice to also you're such a great writer.P.S.Hi Rose just wanted to ask you a question ,the triple chocolate proposal cake do we have the whole recipe for this or you're going to explain to us when you post it .... thank you so much hope to hear from you soon...

I have yet to get a genoise to the required height and only measure when Rose so stipulates. I'm just happy when something hasn't fallen or resembles a meteor crater. Your cake looks delicious. Love the nail! This early posting if very helpful. Hope you're having a marvelous time in Mexico.

Marie, I have that same pan and I was worried all the batter wouldn't fit since it is only 2.5 inches tall on the inside. I poured some extra batter into two little molds just in case. Then I forgot to turn my oven down 25 degrees since the pan is dark and so my cake was a little overbaked. I am firing that pan for good now! But you are right; the caramel whipped cream is the star of the show. Nice to know a regular nail will do in a pinch! I also only measure my finished cakes if Rose stipulates a height, or if it is looking a little short.

I been on the fence about this cake for days now.. I have a Hot Chocolate Party with my "chicas" tomorrow, and figure this cake + the Hot Chocolate would be an overload.. but, I seriously re-thinking my stand, specially hearing about the wonderful whipped caramel (I do love caramel)... Today I have to prep the food for the event tomorrow, I may fit in this cake and follow Jenn's and make it on the smaller size.. As you can gather by this long comment post, I'm still trying to make up my mind about this. HA!

My advice to Monica, Hanaa, and anyone else unsure about this recipe---please DO bake this cake!! It is so delicious! I hope you all will visit me visit me at www.artfuloven.com to see my results. I baked the cake one evening and made the other components and put it all together the next evening. This recipe is not to be missed!

Funny post Marie. I never thought of ganache as "cement" before. Woody needs to visit you in MN more often so you can bake together again. Your cake is so tall and beautiful. I love the daylight cake shot. Btw, what kind of macro lens did you guys get?

I didn't want to disappoint Woody, but since you asked a direct question, I have to admit that I don't have a new macro lens. I use my 18-55 mm kit lens and crop the photo to get the close-ups. Thanks for your compliment.

Hello Marie, and thank you for stopping by and leaving me such a nice comment that was sweet of you. I need to ask you a question about make the whipped caramel cream , I did try and make it and it just curled up on me and I do not know why it did that so I decided to make the most saline buttercream with mocha flavor and a bit of expresso and and I guess a couple ounces of chocolate.

Lovely cake, as always! So jealous that you had so many baking sessions with Woody - how fun :) I wasn't able to make the caramel whipped cream this time, but definitely will in the future (thanks for everyone's encouragement)!